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Bit-ship Ld27 By lcass

First ludum dare and here is my game its called bitship took about 23 hours to make and contains around 3400 lines of java!. No external libraries were used, this is pure java goodness ,enjoy!

read the tutorial for controls , they are abit strange.

---REQUIRES JAVA 7---
If you try to run it on mac make sure you have it installed, Apple dont like java so it doesnt allow it to be installed automatically.

---You must change mode to place blocks. this is done by pressing e . Your mode is shown on the top left---

---TUTORIAL BELOW---

After requests I have made a youtube tutorial just here

-----> http://youtu.be/oP4W4NeaabQ

-----> STORY <-----
Life was good in the year 2078 firmware programmed robots were used on space ships around the galaxy, you are the core computer aboard the ship you control everything. When being given the task to test out the effects of large speed boosts using the oberth effect you manage to generate a wormhole! You are sent across the universe and after lots of time and your ship being almost entirely destroyed other than the nanobots and your energy signiture you find that you are one galaxy away. Unfortunatly that galaxy is riddled with threats bandits,rogue droids you name it.

Fight your way through all 40 levels can you win the game?

As you fight through level become exponentially harder as the enemy becomes more powerful than your puny system can handle.
Use your wit to survive.

Don't forget your borgs, when made they can serve as a valuable resource boosting power, shields and autofiring weapons. Be careful though as they are outdated by 100s of years and are all rusty so take it slow when trying to program them or they might just decide to go the other way.

Your outdated systems take 10 seconds to recharge the enemy has more fire power and shields that recharge faster, Strategy is the key.

Create the Bit-Ship!

sorry for it being low res youtube is being really annoying atm.

press p to start the fights can you win all the way to level 40?

---Known bugs---
When moving left or right after projectiles are fired flashes of the projectile images are seen on the left/right side of screen.

lag can sometimes occur when moving.

---Future development---
So this game has been great, i've heard lots of good things and things that can be improved. I am going to do a full remake of the game so that its more efficient (the way I coded it was quick but not good for efficiency) And I will be changing the gameplay hugely. A post about this will be up on www.java-gaming.org sometime in the near future.

That is a very very neat idea that you have. I love the concept "build your ship, then fight!".

Of course, there is a long way to go for your game to be really playable, and many things to talk about it.

I will try to give only one piece of advice:

When explaining something complex, I think that you should first start by explaining what the "goal/end state" is, and after that you explain how to get there.

For example, you have this huge manual above, but only in the very last line it says that you can "press P to fight other ships", I almost missed it.

I suggest you re-organize your manual. Start by explaining that in this game you build ships and then use them to fight other ships. Then say that the game has three states - and what they do! After all of that, start explaining how building works.

If you have a good manual, even the most complex games become playable :-)

The menu of items to build, which reminded me of a level editor interested me! If you continue to develop this, have you considered showing the keyboard shortcuts on the menu and simplifying how to start, maybe with the first level already constructed?

This is really impressive for something made in 2 days. It's so complicated that I don't really feel like I can make proper sense of it mechanically right now. Ideally I would spend about an hour figuring out how everything works.

But man, concept and execution are very impressive. I'm not sure what it has to do with the theme though :p

Great game, I like it very much. It's a bit complicated, though. But the tutorial video made it much easier. Only the mixed keyboard/mouse controls remain confusing, because I always forget to use the keyboard instead of the mouse. So I've put some blocks behind the controls :)

This could be a very strategy heavy game, but as it is, it's only about "who can patiently wait the longest until he got enough energy generators to create a battleship"
The 10-second delay outside of battles seemed unnecessary, since you have unlimited time building. I had a hard time telling the different factories apart. And why would I make a floor if it only made my ship burn more easily?

But if you made some tweaks to the gameplay (and made it easier to understand), it could be a great strategy game.

Right, as some previous posters have mentioned the learning curve is quite steep. That said, it's pretty impressive how much was put into this game in such a short amount of time.

The video tutorial was extremely helpful in picking up the game to get started playing. Without the video I was basically clicking and trying to figure out how to control the game.

Now controls should definitely be mentioned here because the keyboard/mouse combo was pretty awkward for me to get accustomed to.

That said, if you invest a little time into the game it's interesting. Complex to pick up though. Ideally the game should be user friendly enough to allow someone to come in, click around and figure some things out. Not everything mind you, but get the gist of the game. I would work on user friendliness on this and future projects, it deters quite a few people not explaining the game in the game... if that makes sense

Wow that is a really great idea and a lot of work must have been gone into this. I often thought of making a game where you build your own ship. However games kind of have to explain themselves in my opinion. Especially in a context like this compo people will not take the time to learn such a complex game. But this is a great start.

I really wish you could click on a tile to select it, as that is my natural instinct and I did so several times, placing tiles I shouldn't have placed. It was a bit overwhelming and complicated, which is a bit of a burden for most people. I think the learning curve can easily put someone off.

I played around a bit after watching the tutorial, but still didn't fully understand what I was doing or what my objective was :(

Really awesome. I mean it. Probably needs a little more in-game explanation, and I've got the feeling that power sometimes just disappears when weapons are destroyed.
But it's freakin' awesome all the way. Congrats. 2 days just to do this ? Man, a lot of people must feel bad now XD

I like it. A very ambitious and impressive project for the 48-hour time frame. Also, you sound a lot younger than I expected. Good work on this!

I've been looking for a finished game that was something like this for a long time, with player-built hulls, the ability to fly and fight ships in a semi-tactical way, etc. Add in some more detailed ship physics, the ability to zoom out and actually have to aim at enemy vessels, and so on, and this could be a really neat finished game. Thanks for putting it together!

way too complicated for my blood. at least without more detailed controls

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